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Living Single

We all have socially awkward experiences, but what makes a social interaction so uncomfortable? Research has pointed to 10 kinds of experiences that are especially likely to make people feel awkward, and 6 things people can do to escape from the awkwardness (without just walking away) and feel comfortable again.

A new review of a huge amount of data suggests that loneliness, social isolation, and living alone are all linked to shorter lives. Does that mean that living alone is bad for your health even if you love going solo? That's what the New York Times claimed. Here's why they are wrong.

For the first time, more babies are being born to cohabiting mothers than to single mothers. Both of those family types, though, are worse off economically than married-parent families. How should we think about that and what should we do?

New research shows the power of having different people in your life who are good at helping you with different kinds of emotions. People with a diverse portfolio of "emotionships" are more satisfied with their lives. People who put all their emotional eggs into one relationship basket get celebrated by all the sappy love songs but they are not necessarily better off.

If you have friends who are married, should you assume that those friends share all of your communications and conversations – both the routine ones and those told in confidence – with their spouse? What does it mean if couples see themselves only as a unit and not also as individuals?

There is a vast swath of unearned privileges that have gone largely unrecognized, even though they unfairly advantage about half of the adult population in the U.S.—marital privileges. People who marry enjoy social, cultural, economic, and political advantages that single people do not, simply because they are married.

A 30-item quiz promises to reveal your perfectionist tendencies and, along the way, let you know what perfectionism really is. But how do you know whether this quiz, or any other, really does measure what it claims to measure?

For way too long, reporters who should know better have been perpetuating myths about the benefits of marrying based on working papers and press releases. Finally, someone challenged those claims instead of just repeating them.

When "experts" offer their opinions on single people, they sometimes reveal what they do not know about single people and single life. A recent New York Times story includes a number of claims just begging to be critiqued. Readers, have at it!

In a study of lifelong single people in Ireland, 65 and older, those who had chosen to live single were happier and had fewer regrets than those who were single because of constraints. The single-by-choice seniors were contentedly pursuing their interests, volunteering, and socializing with friends and relatives.

The growing awareness of white privilege and male privilege has opened our eyes to many other kinds of privileges. Yet amidst all this consciousness-raising, most people have remained oblivious to the unearned privileges that advantage at least half of the adult population – people who are married.

Heard about the recent research supposedly showing that marrying makes people lastingly happier? It actually showed that in vast swaths of the world, married people are not happier than single people. It also replicated the finding that any increase in happiness among people who get married and stay married is just a short-lived honeymoon effect.

In this, the first of two posts on the latest study claiming that getting married makes you happier, I explain why no study has ever definitively shown that getting married causes people to become happier—and no study ever will. In Part 2, I'll critique the latest study in detail.

Researchers have long assumed that we discuss our most intimate matters only with the most important people in our lives. A sociologist just tested that assumption, and discovered just how wrong we have been.

If I fed a transcript of your communications into a computer, could the computer tell if you were lying? In a review of 44 studies, some cues to deception were unearthed by the computer programs. In important ways, though, the computers were really pretty lame at figuring out who was lying.

For decades, teenagers and young adults have been telling researchers how lonely they feel. Guess what? In contrast to all the scary headlines you have been seeing about the increasingly lonely Americans, trends suggest just the opposite. What should we make of that?

I wasn't so sure I would appreciate a book called "How to Be Alone" – I love my solitude and hardly need lessons. It turns out, though, that Sara Maitland's book is filled with great insights and perspectives. Here are a few of my favorites.

You have probably heard countless claims about detecting deception made by Paul Ekman, the most famous deception researcher in the world. In my opinion, he is not the best deception researcher. Maria Hartwig is. I have asked her to tell us what we should and should not believe about cues to deception, and how well we can detect deception, in this guest post.

It seems obvious that over time, the statements given by witnesses who are telling the truth will be more consistent than those given by witnesses who are lying. The prosecutor in the Ferguson, Missouri case (in which a white police officer shot and killed an unarmed Black man) seemed to assume that. But is it true?

Social scientists have addressed one of the central questions of our lives: How do we become our best and truest self? The goals we set and the plans we make are critical, but how do we know whether we are pursuing the goals that will result in a meaningful and fulfilling life?

When people see their romantic partner as the center of their life, but are not so sure their partner feels the same way about them, friends get caught in the cross-hairs. People who are insecure about their romantic relationship act badly when their loved-one wants to hang out with friends—and that bad behavior threatens the relationship they care about the most.

Many people who choose to live single are not doing so because they are waiting for "the one" or "putting marriage aside" or because marriage "does not offer a good deal anymore." Marriage was never on the table.

Do you think that it is married people who are holding our families and communities together, who are most generous, and who are contributing the most toward the care of old and disabled people who cannot care for themselves? Here are 10 evidence-based ways in which you are wrong. It is single people who are the most connected, caring, and generous.

Throughout history, people have often bemoaned "the sharp decline of social trust and the breakdown of community ties." Today, those social ills are sometimes pinned on the rise of single people. The data, though, indicate that it is people who get married who become more insular.

Studies of the social psychology of boredom show that we can bore people with what we say or don't say and with our style of interacting. We are right to worry about being boring: people who are judged as boring are judged harshly in many other ways, too. There is, though, one way in which boring people are seen as superior to interesting ones.

About Living Single

In the spirit of the book, Singled Out, Living Single is a myth-busting, consciousness-raising, totally unapologetic take on single life. At this blog, we discuss just about everything about single life -- except dating!